Historic southern pacific railroad station - Certified SoftWash Roof Cleaning

Alejandro Riojas · Community Member

Historic southern pacific railroad station

Alejandro Riojas · Community Member

Hey guys I need to make a porposal on this building. It is real dirty all around! The roof will not be done due to leakage! How would you guys price this and what should I look for ? can somebody tell me what type of gutters these are thank y'all

John Aloisio · SoftWash Systems 5-Star Professional

The glitters and downspouts are half round and round copper. The green is the oxidizing of the surface copper and called a patina. You will take that color off with a softwash, but it will come back with time and weather. As long as the owner knows up front they should be okay. I would price it out with a 1.5% mix and pretreat all the bad areas first.

Alejandro Riojas · Community Member

and im guessing the gutters are full copper is it half and half of whatever?

Ray Burke · Community Member

What John said....and I'de pretreat with about a 50/50 mixture. Pricing for my company would be between 3-5K, if the rear was no more difficult than the front. Should take 2 days.

Matt Jennemann · Junior Member

Hey guys I haven't done copper gutters yet. Will they turn back to the original copper color or do they dull out? Nice to know for future reference.

John Aloisio · SoftWash Systems 5-Star Professional

They will turn back eventually. You can also buy a spray that will turn them faster...in a week or two. We have used it on new copper flat seam roofs we installed that the owner wanted to look older...go figure??

Dan Dykstra · Senior Member

If they want the cooper to look "new" and shinny (which is what everyone up here wants) it will be very very labor intensive job. You will have to clean all the copper then treat it and seal it.

Alejandro Riojas · Community Member

hey dan what do you use to treat and seal the copper?

Ray Burke · Community Member

Matt:
I've found that copper can react differently, make no guarantees on the outcome! I've seen it brighten up and get shiny, i've also seen it dull down, and in a couple of instances I've seen it go bright green.

AC Lockyer · Administrator

Alejandro Riojas wrote:
hey dan what do you use to treat and seal the copper?

Copper restoration is it's own business. Kinda like the marble thread we had recently. It can be done but it takes allot of steps.

1. Use a chem like aluminum brightener to clean the tough stains and oxidation off the copper.
2. Hand rub each and every square inch to a luster with a rim polishing kit like you find at an auto parts store.
3. Clean off the wax residue with lacquer thinner.
4. Spray a lacquer sealer on the copper to keep it from oxidizing so it keeps its luster and sheen.

Most companies that do this professionally get about 10k to do just the front gutters on a home.

Manage the customers expectations. Most customers like the brown and green patenias and don't want you messing with the natural ageing.

AC

Bill Booz · Junior Member

To answer your question about 50/50 metal gutters... when he said half copper, he meant half round and was not referring to a blend of metals. They are solid copper. Half round refers to the style. Most gutters you see are K style white anodized aluminum. Again the K refers to the shape.